More resources needed to help Asian seniors, says newly formed Asian Canadian Seniors Health Network

KIM PEMBERTON
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Published on: December 4, 2016

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Asian Canadian seniors often have poor health outcomes after being placed in long-term care homes that aren’t culturally sensitive to their needs, says a newly formed Asian Canadian Seniors Health Network.

For many seniors in a culturally insensitive nursing home, where no one speaks their language or understands their ways, their last years become their most socially isolated and miserable years. And often die they earlier than expected living in facilities they don’t feel comfortable.

That was the case for Henry Yu’s 85-year-old grandmother who suffered a stroke, and like all seniors going into long-term residential care had to take the first available bed in the health authority region where she lived.

“Her last three years she was unhappy living in a facility where no one spoke Chinese and she had chronic indigestion because her diet had changed. She would say I don’t want to live anymore and she never came off the wait list,” Yu, a University of B.C. history professor, said referring to the long wait to get into the linguistically and culturally appropriate care home run by SUCCESS, one of the largest social-service agencies in B.C.

“She might have lived a lot longer if she was in a culturally sensitive facility. There are many stories like this, but these are challenges that we can meet.”

Yu is one of a number of people who helped create a newly formed Asian Canadian Seniors Health Network, which includes organizations such as SUCCESS and the Progressive Intercultural Community Services Society — both of which are delivering culturally sensitive residential care services for Asian Canadian seniors.

Some of the networks’ key recommendations, from a roundtable discussion recently, include:

• Given the changing demographics and growing senior population, the government needs to give a high priority to new proposals for residential care beds that are culturally sensitive for Asian seniors.

• Allocate additional resources to enhance assisted living units to meet the health and well-being needs of Asian Canadian seniors.

• Create new beds to meet the increasing demands for culturally sensitive long-term care facilities.

Network co-chair Queenie Choo, who is also the CEO of SUCCESS, pointed out that in Richmond, 60 per cent of the population is Asian and the demand for culturally sensitive residential care for seniors will only continue to grow. She said the waiting list is four years for Asian seniors to get into the long-term residential care home with 113 beds for Chinese Canadians run by SUCCESS. The organization also has similar waiting lists for its two assisted-living centres — a 50-bed home in Richmond and a 33-bed home in downtown Vancouver.

The wait list to get into one of the 34 independent suites for seniors at a Japanese culturally sensitive facility is eight years, said Cathy Makihara of Nikkei Place Seniors. The community also has a 59-bed assisted-living facility.

In Surrey, there is a 55-bed assisted-living unit for Indo-Canadian seniors and the Progressive Intercultural Community Services Society is hoping to build a culturally sensitive, 140-bed, long-term, residential-care facility called Diversity Village, said society communications officer Shruti Prakash-Joshi.

“We just lost six clients who were lost and isolated after they had to move from the assisted-living unit (run by the society) to a mainstream facility,” said Prakash-Joshi. “No one understands their needs (at the new facility) and they lose the will to live. Why are we not able to provide a culturally sensitive approach to the care we give seniors?”

Choo said the network is encouraging government to create opportunities for culturally sensitive care training for staff working at all stages of seniors care, from home care to assisted living to residential care.

“We need policies to ensure culturally sensitive care is the top issue for caring for seniors in B.C.,” she said
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